


The Coward Left

by still_lycoris



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Gen, Grief/Mourning, POV First Person, Post Gauda Prime, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-01
Updated: 2014-05-01
Packaged: 2018-01-21 13:28:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1552142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/still_lycoris/pseuds/still_lycoris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vila thinks about how to remember friends after the events of Gauda Prime</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Coward Left

God, I need a drink.

There’s probably loads of drink on this planet somewhere. Maybe I can steal it. I can steal anything, me. That’s all I am, a thief. All I ever was. Not a hero. I was never a hero. My mentor always said to me, don’t be a hero, just get in and get out again, don’t get caught up …

But I got caught up, didn’t I? I got caught up and now they’re all dead and I’m on my own and they’re all bloody dead and I watched them die, oh God, I want a drink, I want _anything_ , I don’t want to remember it, I don’t want to remember it ever again, not ever …

Okay. Okay, so. So, years back, before she left, my Mum told me you had to do your best to remember things how you wanted to remember them. When the bad bits crept in, you just had to push them out and only remember what made you feel good. Course, it was a pretty stupid idea, didn’t do _her_ any good in the end but sometimes, sometimes when things were particularly awful, I’d remember it and it sometimes meant the really bad stuff got more in the background because you focused on the better stuff.

I did it when Gan died. Every time I thought about him down in that awful, empty control, I thought about him smiling at me on the _London_ , laughing at my stupid jokes, letting me cuddle with him when I had nightmares and never expecting, never _wanting_ anything back. And it wasn’t so bad then, I could blot it out a bit. He was still one of the best friends I’d ever had, still a good man and still _there_ somehow. Still there.

Did it with Cally too. She wasn’t all broken and burned on Terminal, she was on the _Liberator_ somewhere, all pretty clothes and feathery hair. She’d sing sometimes, in your mind, without meaning to and it was so pretty that none of us ever told her in case she’d stop. She looked so fragile but she was so strong, steel under silk.

It’s better to remember them that way.

So I won’t remember Blake all dirty and scarred and wretched and clutching at Avon with blood pouring out of him. No, I’ll remember him when he was on the _Liberator_ and he would smile when he was pleased and laugh with us and was a good man, he was a good man and if I remember him like that, he’ll always be a good man and a hero and someone that looked after people and protected us and was our friend.

And I’ll remember bloody Tarrant with his bloody smirk, leaning back on the _Scorpio_ like he was some kind of God, proud of himself and young and thinking he was better than everyone. 

And Soolin, all beautiful with a gun in her hand, all this confidence and amusement and maybe she _was_ better than everyone, better than me anyway! I wanted to get to know her better … but I won’t think of it like that, she was an enigma, one of those lovely enigmas in your life, everyone has them, don’t they? 

Dayna with that gold star of hers at her throat, beating me at Galactic Monopoly again. Using a gun almost as well as Soolin, just not as fast, that’s all. And she and Soolin would laugh together and practise weapons and it was just nice to see people being so friendly with each other. 

And Jenna’s out there somewhere, still on a spaceship, still better than anybody else, she’d out-fly Tarrant in a minute and it’ll really piss him off and we’ll all laugh and laugh and laugh … she could be out there, couldn’t she? I didn’t see her … but I don’t know. I can’t imagine that she’d ever have left Blake. Don’t want to imagine it really. So … so … she’s out there. With her ship.

And Avon … he can be on the _Liberator_ too, with Blake. Wearing that stupid silver leather thing that he liked, all proud and wearing those shoes that made him that bit taller than he really was. He always said he wasn’t a hero but the thing was, he wanted to be, I think. More than I did. And I think it all got to him, so much and he got so tired and angry and he was clinging to sanity by a thread and I was scared of him, so bloody scared at the end and I hated that because we’d been real friends once and he was different and then we were on that shuttle …

But I won’t think of him like that. I’ll think of him when he was all controlled and as close to happy as he ever could be, I think. When he was my friend and would laugh with me and we played chess together. When he was a hero.

They were all heroes.

Just the coward left.

God, I need a drink.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the b7friday prompt "Fallen Heroes"

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Coward Left (the Hungry Ghosts remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12055815) by [Quillori](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quillori/pseuds/Quillori)




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